You're Still There When The Rain Clears
by kisstomorrowgoodbyexx
Summary: Axeland Ranch. They thought it would be a great idea…that was till strange things started occurring, and the trip goes awfully wrong. Who will survive and what will be left of them? Quinn/Clay. CHAPTER 9 is up! HIATUS.
1. Chaptire Un

YOU'RE STILL THERE WHEN THE RAIN CLEARS

New story time. x)

TITLE: You're Still There When the Rain Clears

GENERE: Horror/Romance

RATING: PG-13 for language, violence, death of major characters and romance scenes.

COUPLE PAIRINGS: Clay/Quinn, Nathan/Haley, Brooke/Julian, and minor others.

SUMMARY: Axeland Ranch is a small ranch or farm in Charlotte, North Carolina, not far from where six young teenagers go to school. Clay, Quinn, Nathan, Haley, Brooke, Julian, Alex and their teacher Mr. Durham are all taking the next week on their senior trip to Axeland Ranch. Axeland Ranch has a few tourist attractions in a few miles distance, and they thought it would be a great idea…that was till strange things started occurring, and the trip goes awfully wrong. Who will survive and what will be left of them?

Chaptire Un: 

Axeland, Ranch; a ranch that was one of the most famous places back in the early 1900s, but now is abandoned and claimed to be haunted. The Axeland Ranch is located in Charlotte, North Carolina. There were many stories of things that happened there. But the one story that was ever confirmed was the event that took place there on November 19th, 1964. Eight high school seniors and two teachers as their chaperones decided to spend their senior trip week at the Axeland Ranch. These students were from Arlington Academy located right outside of Charlotte, North Carolina. But unfortunately, the students never returned. Why? No one knows. There was rumored to be one survivor, and she still haunts the ranch. But no one has been there since the story leaked out except for exceptionally weird people who believed in ghosts. There were many newspaper articles from that day but no one ever found out what happened. No one cared to know what happened really.

On November 19th, 1964, it was a warm and smug night. The air was heavy and thick and the students from Arlington Academy had just arrived on the land of the ranch. They were all excited to wonder what they were going to experience at the ranch and hope to have many stories to go back to school with to tell their peers before they graduated. They had heard about the Axeland Ranch when someone had done a report about it, and they figured that was going to be where they were going to spend their week on their senior trip. Arriving at the ranch, the oldest female of the five girls and the youngest out of three other boys, Mae Scott, was the only one to first start experiencing strange noises. The bus had been stopped, when all of a sudden it jerked forward, and Mae heard a shrill scream. It was said to be that it was just an accident when one of the teachers didn't put the bus in park and a girl was standing up when the bus jerked.

Mae thought it was anything other then just some coincidence. Mae was a strong believer in ghosts and things of that sort. She described to her friends that it wasn't just a coincidence and her friends told her to lighten up a bit because it was their week off from school, but she didn't let go of her theory that it wasn't just a thing that happened. Even their teacher claimed that he clearly put the bus in park. But no one was there, no one still alive was there on that night, so there was no way to possibly really tell. Mae Scott wasn't insane, paranoid, or crazy. She just had this weird feeling that something was going to happen and she was trying to get her words out into a form of a warning, but it didn't seem to come out.

Mae's friends and two teachers weren't there to see and admit that she was right that there was something strange going on there. One by one, Mae's friends were killed, all in such a unique way that it was odd. She was getting more afraid each time that one of her friends was taken from her. Then at the end of the week whatever it was came after Mae. Trying to escape, Mae got trapped in side the house. She felt a presence, and she knew that there was something there and they were trying to get revenge and trying to get Mae and her friends out and when they refused to leave they were killed. Mae was reported to be killed that night, but there were other articles and some even wrote books on the tragedy and say that Mae Scott is truly still alive.

_Present._

Quinn James stood at her locker with her younger sister (only by a few minutes), Haley, and her two best friends Brooke and Alex. Her perfectly straight dark brown hair and her bright baby blue eyes pierced in to her friend's as she laughed at something her sister had said. Quinn was the one to disable the popularity status at Tree Hill High. She hated labels and statuses, so she kept the calm down on most of it but the fact that they were pretty much most popular girls in school didn't help. Some called her a hypocrite, but she wasn't. All in all she was a pretty good person. She knew the point of view of that not so skinny freshman or sophomore, or just a transferring student. She knew how those people felt and she constantly tried to tell people that. But she was judged on how she looked now, and how many friends she had. It was wrong.

When she entered her junior year of high school she instantly fit in. Though it wasn't something she wanted to do. But she did. She fit right in and her sister just kind of mingled with her and eventually became one of them. She had almost everything she wanted in life. She had a great sister, she had two best friends, and she had a pretty amazing boyfriend, David. David and Quinn met in her junior year when she transferred into Tree Hill High School, and there was an instant attraction there. They started dating a few weeks after they met, and have been ever since. He was kind of a rebel, and he was captain of the football team and co-captain of the basketball team at Tree Hill High.

David's best friend, Nathan Scott, was Haley's husband. They had gotten married just before Quinn had transferred in, and all in all he heard many stories about Nathan Scott but you really couldn't judge a person on who you heard about right? But, when she met him he was a completely different person then the one that she heard about. That was because he was in love, and he was in love with her sister. They made a very beautiful couple. She always rooted for her sister to have someone really great, but she didn't expect it to be the captain of the basketball team.

Tree Hill High wasn't a small school. But things seem to get around quick. That was probably because it was such a small own. Senior year had finally come for Quinn and the others and she was genuinely excited. Hearing the bell ring she shut her locker door and she turned around only to be face to face with her charming boyfriend. Quinn jumped back her back slamming into the lockers and she held a hand over her chest, over her heart, as it was beating rapidly. He chuckled at his girlfriend's actions and he wrapped his arms around her and he kissed her cheek softly. But she soon wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him in for a real kiss.

"Get a room would you?"

Quinn pulled away at the female voice of her twin sister. They may have been twins, but they were nothing alike by their looks or their personalities. She apologized and she blushed, a light red on her porcelain cheeks. She slapped her boyfriend on the shoulder and she pushed herself off the lockers and started walking to class with her sister and her two best friends. David was walking behind them. They entered their computer class, and Quinn took a seat in the middle row with her sister on one side of her and Brooke on the other. David went to the back with Nathan and Clay. Brooke eyed one of the boys in the opposite end of their row and she smirked. He was probably going to be one of her new potentials. Brooke Davis never really settled down. She liked to be different, and she had a few trust issues. Quinn understood that.

As the guys messed around on their computers in the back Quinn stayed faced to the front while the teacher called the roll. There were so many seniors but there were only ten that were taking the visual arts class. Their teacher Mr. Durham stood up from his desk and he grabbed the stack of blue folders handing one out to each of the ten students. The boys in the corner stopped playing around and they were intrigued as to what was in the folder.

"What is this?" Quinn asked.

"It's the pamphlet for your end of the year trip!" Mr. Durham said just a little too over excited for it.

"Where are we going?" David asked.

"Axeland Ranch."

Quinn snapped her head up from looking down at her folder to Mr. Durham. She wondered if he meant the same Axeland Ranch that she did her report on. She had done for visual arts a PowerPoint Presentation about Axeland Ranch and all the myths and legends that were there. He must have been very intrigued to have to plan their end of the year trip there. She shifted her eyes and she shook her head. She looked back down at her pamphlet and she flipped open the book again and she looked through it and sure enough by the picture it was the same Axeland Ranch that they took their trip on. Part of Quinn didn't want to attend this trip, but the other part of her kind of wanted to, to find out what really goes on at the ranch. She was that kind of gal.

Later that night, Quinn sat at her laptop typing up her English paper, when her eyes shifted over to the pamphlet on her desk of the Axeland Ranch. Just its name gave her goose bumps all over her skin. She wondered about a lot of the accusations of the Axeland Ranch, and suddenly she got excited. She saved her paper and closed it down. She opened up an internet browser and she typed the name of the ranch in the search engine. **3,200 results listed.** She clicked on the first few links till she came up to a page with a black background and it looked eerie. She tried closing it out, but it seemed to be frozen on that page. She moved her cursor over to the tabs, and she clicked on the article tab.

Her eyes quickly scanned the article. This was nothing like she read. She moved her cursor over the red 'x' again at the top of her browser and it closed out. She shut her laptop and Quinn got up from her chair. Did she even want to go anymore? Hell, who was she kidding, she wanted to go, and wanted to confirm the rumors. She took her pamphlet and her form and trotted downstairs.

"Haley-bob…have you seen Mom and Dad?"

"Yep, they're signing my form in the living room."

Quinn thanked her twin and she smiled. She turned and walked down the hallway and through the foyer. She entered the living room and she handed her form over to her parents.

"Here is mine."

Quinn left them to sign the papers and she walked into the kitchen again joining her sister. Quinn stole a coffee cake from the counter and she wrapped her arm around her twin sister. She looked down at the book that her sister was writing in, and seemed to be deeply into. She flipped up the cover and looked at the title. It was a fictional story that was written on the supposed story that happened that fateful night at Axeland Ranch. She shook her head and walked to the refrigerator where she grabbed a bottle of Gatorade out and took a sip.

"Can you believe that we're actually going to this place? There is so much history behind this place."

"Hales, seriously, how can you believe a fictional story?"

"You did that report, what about all those accusations and the stories of what happened?"

"Who knows…I guess we'll find out."

Quinn shrugged her shoulders and she headed up to her room not wanting to think about their trip anymore. The next morning came in a blur. She felt like she had just gone to sleep, when she had gotten up. She jolted her head up from the laptop and she pushed her hand through her hair. She furrowed her eyebrows as to what she was doing sleeping near her laptop. She opened the top of the laptop and saw the many opened web pages about Axeland Ranch. Quinn exited out of all them and shut down her laptop. She didn't remember being on the computer all night, but she definitely felt it.

After getting ready, she headed downstairs to grab her breakfast and her form and headed to school. She did just so grabbing a pack of strawberry pop tarts and her form and she walked out with her sister to her car. The trip was starting Sunday night and that was only two days away. They arrived at school on time and they mingled like usual in the morning with their group as they called it. By the time they got to Mr. Durham's class Quinn had over worried herself, and the whole period David tried to calm her down. She loved that boy; he was always by her side.


	2. Chaptire Deux

YOU'RE STILL THERE WHEN THE RAIN CLEARS

TITLE: You're Still There When the Rain Clears

GENERE: Horror/Romance

RATING: PG-13 for language, violence, death of major characters and romance scenes.

COUPLE PAIRINGS: Clay/Quinn, Nathan/Haley, Brooke/Julian, and minor others.

SUMMARY: Axeland Ranch is a small ranch or farm in Charlotte, North Carolina, not far from where six young teenagers go to school. Clay, Quinn, Nathan, Haley, Brooke, Julian, Alex and their teacher Mr. Durham are all taking the next week on their senior trip to Axeland Ranch. Axeland Ranch has a few tourist attractions in a few miles distance, and they thought it would be a great idea…that was till strange things started occurring, and the trip goes awfully wrong. Who will survive and what will be left of them?

Chapitre Deux:

"Let's go! Let's go!"

Mr. Durham yelled as Quinn and others sat against the wall. The sun hadn't come up yet, because it was still a bit early. They had to arrive at school early to even get there at a decent hour. The trip to Axeland Ranch was about four hours from Tree Hill. Sure, that ranch was right outside of Charlotte, but they had to make bathroom stops and fuel stops for the bus.

"She isn't really excited about this is she?"

"Nope, but I don't see why she went if she was excited about going. I'm just doing it to get away for the next week. What about you Clay?"

He nodded in agreement, as if saying it was the same reason as David was going. They put their bags in the under compartment of the bus and then boarded the bus. The girls had claimed a few seats to themselves in their own little group near the back and the guys claimed the middle, but hence Nathan being tall it was kind of hard to fit on one seat. He could stretch along two seats but he'd be uncomfortable with no back support between the seats.

"So how are you and David?"

"We're alright I guess…you know, like always."

"Quinn, come on, snap out of it."

"I'm sorry, I'm trying."

It took four hours to actually get to Axeland Ranch. They had to stop three times. One of those times was for gas, and the two other times were because the bus was acting up and he had to stop and pull over to let it cool down before driving again. It spooked Quinn a little bit but she knew she was just acting crazy. She needed to calm down or else she was never going to be excited to be away for the next week. Quinn put a smile on her face as she sat down next to Clay. Most of the trip there they played card games, or hand games. They could be kids around each other.

David grew green with envy every time he saw his girlfriend with Clay. He never really liked Clay. Ever since he arrived at Tree Hill High School, in their freshman year, he seemed to be after Quinn. Quinn reassured David all the time that Clay was just a friend to her, and that if nothing happened in the last three years then she was sure nothing was ever going to develop between them. Clay was a big player, though Quinn knew he was a sweet guy, he pretended he had a tough exterior. She laughed some of the times when he tried to be macho.

When they got to Axeland Ranch, Quinn got a very eerie feeling. Thunder rolled once they entered the city. She thought it was just a coincidence. She was going to keep herself calm and not worry about the stories that she had read about. She needed to be calm or she was going to over worry herself. The town was deserted, there was no one out. The city looked like it had been abandoned many years ago, and probably has been since that night many years ago. The bus jerked and the kids went forward. They started protesting at Mr. Durham but he held his hands up in innocence.

"QUIET! That wasn't me, the bus just completely shut down."

Quinn looked to Clay and he shook his head warning her not to seep into her thoughts about what was going on.

"Clay please don't give me that look, the bus has been janky twice since we left, and now it just completely shut down. This is just some coincidence!"

"I'm not giving you any look, but I don't think you should go and assume that it was some paranormal thing that just shut down the bus."

She scoffed and she got up. She walked down the aisle of the bus and stepped out of it. She checked if everything was alright but Mr. Durham told her it was going to be awhile till the bus was going to be back up. They were going to need assistance, and obviously there was no one around. Quinn pulled out her cell phone. There wasn't any service. She cursed under her breath and she walked around the bus looking down both sides of the narrow road, there wasn't anything for miles, and no one was coming for miles on end.

"Well, how about we walk for some help. We can take our bags if we don't get help on time. The ranch is just through the woods there."

Mr. Durham nodded his head. He scratched it and then he put his cap back on.

"Alright, you four and I will walk through the woods and get to the ranch and set up. Clay, Nathan, and Quinn…I need you to walk into town and see if you can find anyone."

Quinn grabbed her bag. Now she regretted ever coming to this wretched place.

"What if we need someone?" She asked.

"Well once you get into town there should be some service for your cell phone, but if there isn't anyone around and if there isn't any service just come back to the ranch." Mr. Durham said.

And soon they were off.

Quinn walked cautiously down the narrow road getting closer to the town with every step she took. And it seemed with every step she took the road was winding down and the clouds were getting darker. She had already been terrified to even come on the trip but the reason she had was because she was curious as to the mystery that the ranch held. She was interested in mysteries, and always wanted to find out the deeper story, and what _really_ happened the night. She walked ahead of the two other boys for awhile, almost half the way till Nathan decided to speed up a little and see if he could see anything ahead. Quinn was left behind walking with Clay.

They walked in silence for awhile, just walking side by side, the wind blowing through both of their heads of hair. She waited for the right moment to talk but it seemed as though there wasn't going to be a right moment to talk. When she was just about to, he spoke up.

"You look like you have a whole bunch on your mind, you want to talk?" He asked.

"I don't care. What good does talking to anyways?"

"Well…it helps you clearly express the things that you want to get out but can't ever seem to find the right person to get it out to."

"Just David…it's funny how he didn't volunteer to go with us. I thought, you know, maybe he wanted to come with me…but no, Alex is in that group and Brooke. Why the hell would he want to walk with me?"

"Oh come on, stop it. I'm sure he wasn't sent with us without teacher supervision because _he's_ David."

"That might also be it." She shrugged.

"But it could also do with the fact that Alex and Brooke are in that group. How can you stay with someone who's always after someone else that isn't you?"

Clay made a good point. She stretched her mind just a little bit and thought of the possibilities. If David wasn't with her, would he be with Alex? Or would Brooke have given him a chance. But Clay didn't have room to talk.

"Oh yeah, says the guy that constantly is finding a new girl every week to be with." Quinn remarked.

"Okay, that's not fair. I don't have a girlfriend; I'm not tied down with someone. I have the right to fool around with whoever the hell I want to." He shot right back at her.

"I guess you win that one." She agreed.

She crossed her arms and she looked over at Clay. Ever since he got there in freshman year she always had the 'what if' relationship with him. Sure, she liked him and he knew that she liked him and he liked her back but she was with David, so that was totally impossible. She wondered though about David sometimes. Was he even worth giving her whole heart to? Probably not, because he had the reputation that was trashed and everyone trashed it. He was known to always sleep around and cheat on his girlfriends, but Quinn gave him the benefit of the doubt and for two years she hadn't gotten hurt, she hoped that he wasn't going to hurt her either. She knew though that she should never expect the best from people. People were always making you think that they were the best people in the world but they had a different motive in mind. They were the great person you thought they were. Hell, they could be the greatest thing since Cheese Whiz to you, but in reality that's not what everyone else sees.

Quinn snapped out of her moment and she shook her head while Clay spoke, "Have you ever had any doubts?"

"Well, it depends what you mean. Doubts about what, exactly?"

"Doubts about David; maybe he isn't the guy you thought he was."

"I don't want to think that he isn't the guy that I thought he was. I don't want him to come up as a cheater and a liar but that's what most men of this world are about, you know?"

"No, I don't know exactly what you mean." He said. He didn't either. He was a guy…but was he a cheater? No. Was he a liar? No. He was a genuinely nice guy. Or so he thought he was.

"Well…the way I see it, guys and girls value different things. Take relationships for example. How many guys can say that they would resist the temptation to cheat if a Maxim model or a Playboy Bunny walked into the room and say that they wanted to go to a spot where they could spend some time alone?"

"Probably not a lot…I still don't see what you're getting at, Q."

"Guys value sex. Girls value love. If you think about it, it's always proved to be true."

Clay looked at the intelligent woman, who had become such a close friend over the two years.

"You're too smart sometimes, you know that?" He asked with a laugh.

"No…I just know what I want." Quinn said.

Clay nodded his head and he ran ahead to join Nathan. He wondered though what she meant about knowing what she wanted. He would have to ask her later, he thought to himself. They arrived at the deserted city about an hour later. Quinn's feet were hurting from walking so much. When she looked down the path they just walked nothing could be seen. Only a very thick cloud of fog was seen, but no one could see through it, it was so heavy.

"Looks like no one is here, oh well, guess we got to go back to the ranch." Quinn said turning towards the directions of the winding road that led up to the ranch.

"Oh, no you don't. We can't just go back and say that we didn't find anyone here." Clay said grabbing her arm spinning her around.

"Well there isn't much here, so how about we split up and in an hour meet up here?" Nathan asked and Clay and Quinn nodded their heads.

"Sounds good," They both agreed.

Quinn walked off in her direction that she was navigated to go to.


	3. Chaptire Trois

Chapter Trois:

Quinn opened the rusty, old convenient store door, and with it came a very loud creaking noise. She looked around. The store seemed to of been empty for many years. The shelves had food that was old and degraded; a lot of it looked like it had been torn apart by wild animals. Quinn wasn't that surprised. She covered her nose from the stench that filled her nostrils. Her eyes still searching for any type of life in the store, but there was none. She slowly moved to the counter where a cashier seemed to formerly be. Picking up the counter softly she stepped behind the counter and looked around.

The store was a depressing grey color. She felt eerie just standing in the store. She didn't like the feeling that she was getting in the shop. But she had to endure it because they needed help. Quinn peered over to a brown bulletin board on the wall and she leaned forward to get a closer look at it. She took good notice of some of things on there. Some pieces of the old paper were newspaper articles, and some were old receipts. She nodded her head and then turned and continues walking further back into the store. Seeing a light in the back, a glimmer of hope arose in her eyes as if there might have been someone in this store let alone this wretched town.

"Hello?" She calls out. No answer.

She pushes open the door and was hit with a wave of freezing cold air. She jumped back a little, still holding the door and she opened her eyes. She felt as though she had been shot with one of those science fiction guns, which turned you into a block of ice. She shivered and walked into the frozen area. It was the only thing really alive in the town, a freezer full of meats, and other food. Quinn found a food source for them; hence there was no one other store in town that really offered food. Most of the food back in the 1960's must have been grown by crops or something. She didn't the time to ponder about it. She backed out of the freezer area and she closed the door, so the food would stay cold. Why was there a freezer inside of a convenient store? Why was there rolled of packs of what looked like big things of meat inside of a convenient store?

She didn't know. Quinn exited the building the way she came in and she shook her head. She scratched her head and ran her hand through her auburn colored hair. Sighing, she decided to move on to the auto shop.

In the woods, Mr. Durham and the crew were almost to the ranch. David was the leader of the back clearing the path way for Alex and the rest of the crew. Brooke looked on what had been happening with David and Alex. There was definitely something. He didn't clear paths for Quinn; he didn't hold doors open for Quinn. Brooke figured something fishy was going on there.

"Babe, stop staring."

"Staring at what?"

"You know what I'm talking about. Stop staring at David and Alex like you're about to pull out your camera phone and snap picture of a piece of so called evidence."

Damn, he was good. He knew what she was thinking. She sighed and she bit back her lip. He found her guilty of wanting to take a picture of David and Alex and show the evidence to Quinn that he wasn't the good guy that she thought he was. He seemed to be a dirty big slime ball, but no one saw that except for the people around them. Quinn seemed to be very blind by what was called love. Everyone was blinded by love at one time in their life. Brooke had been there with her first love, Lucas. He had moved away after his uncle died and his mother committed suicide. They never really talked anymore, he was living somewhere off the coast of California enjoying the bright blue waves and the warm yellowish sand. She had been with Julian for a year now. One of the best years of her life, but she worried about Lucas sometimes, about where he was and how he was doing.

She shook her head, not wanting to trouble her mind about it anymore. Brooke sighed and continued on walking. How could the principal of Tree Hill High approve a field trip such as this? Maybe this wasn't the place that they should have ended up at. She didn't know how a principal could entrust a chaperone with a few seniors at a big ranch in the middle of nowhere. It wasn't a state registered house, no one lived there. They arrived at the ranch about half an hour later. The ranch was huge with a large plantation house on the land. Brooke gasped in amazement as to how well shape the house looked for standing empty for so long. She figured there was something fishy going on, but she didn't want to over think it. That was Quinn's job.

The plantation house was white and wide. The columns were painted black and there were a few vines growing on the columns, wrapping around them as they continued growing slowly. Brooke and Haley walked up to the door and turned the knob of the wooden door. It slid open and Brooke stepped inside her flip flops clacking against the wooden floor. She suddenly felt a cool wind blow by her and she turned around but saw nothing. Her heart pounded faster and faster. It wasn't normal.

"Hey look, a piece of parchment paper." Haley pointed out.

"Hales, you could just say a piece of paper."

"Whatever, I like to be specific." She said and she picked up the piece of paper that was lying on the wooden table in the middle of the foyer of the large plantation house. Brooke resumed walking across the wooden floor to the table and she picked up the piece of paper.

"Dear Seniors, I know this isn't something that you expected but due to economical reasons this is where you will be staying. Hopefully you'll have fun and enjoy your week off from school. Have a nice time kids." Brooke read directly off the letter. "…sincerely Mr. Turner," She ended. "Sincerely, seriously, how can he be so sincere about an eerie place and expect us to have fun?"

"Brooke, just calm down, there is no need to worry. Mr. Turner was always a douche." Haley mumbled the last part under her breath.

Quinn wandered into the auto shop. It was filled. There were two cars, one that must have had some work being done on it, and the other one looked like someone was building onto it. She raised her thin eyebrow and then brushed her hand on her shoulder. Cobwebs filled the place that she was in. Clearly there was no one in the place so she backed out and returned to the middle of the place. She was done searching around what she had to do. She folded her arms over her chest and she decided that she was going to wait for the boys. Thunder rolled and she felt a wet drop on her head. She looked up and she figured in the next five minutes it was going to rain. No doubt about that one.

And just as she predicted five minutes later the rain started falling down. She jogged towards the store and opened the door. Getting inside she took some shelter. She knew that storm was coming. But she didn't know how bad the storm was going to be. She sighed and walked over to one of the windows. Taking her hand she wiped off some of the dust and peered through the empty town. She had about thirty more minutes before Clay and Nathan were going to get back from searching in their designated areas. She sighed and she pressed her lips together awaiting the dreadful storm.

Clay peeked into the small shelter/church that was down the gravel road, a few hundred feet from the convenient store that Quinn was in, and a few hundred feet from where Nathan was. He pushed open the thick and heavy wooden door. He stepped in and he heard the droplets of rain coming down on the roof the droplet sound getting heavier with each few seconds. Clay shut the door behind himself and he saw a few cots that were laid out in the shelter area, there were toys (apparently there were kids residing in this town), and blankets and clothes strewn all over the place. What really happened here? How many people actually lived in this town some forty to fifty years ago?

"Hello?" He called out.

He didn't get a response. He heard some shuffling in the back corner and when he bent over and around the counter to check where the shuffling noise came from, a cat jumped out of the box of food obviously feeding on the food that the people left there rotten or not causing Clay to jump back in fright. His heart started beating rapidly and he watched as the cat scurried out of the shelter by a small hole in the wall, that someone or something must have made over the course of the years. Once he got his heartbeat back to a normal pace he made his way over to the two wooden doors of the church that were connected to the shelter. Pushing the heavy wooden doors opened his eyes laid upon a casket lying on top of the altar but there was no one else in the church. There were a few candles ablaze, the wax growing in a huge pile on the floor.

The candles must have been burning since the funeral. Then his eyes moved back to the casket. What if there was a person in that casket? He didn't want to think about it. He shut his eyes and he slowly backed out of the church. He shut the doors and he ran out of the shelter not wanting to think about what he saw in the church. He had seen enough, he was going back to rejoin Quinn. And that's what he did. He resumed on his short walk back to the convenient store where he saw Quinn in the window. He waved softly and then he opened the door. The smell instantly hit him.

"What is that smell?" He asked completely disgusted, the metal door shutting behind him.

"I have no idea, but we have enough food for the week if we run out. There is a freezer back there with wrapped up food, the freezer obviously kept them fresh for the last couple years."

"Sounds sweet, has Nathan returned yet?"

"Nope, but I hope he does soon."

Nathan walked around the town aimlessly. He stopped at a few gas stations but there wasn't anything there. The gas wasn't pumping, and it looked like no one resided there for a few decades. He walked up to the convenient store and walked in joining Clay and Quinn. He told them both about things that he saw and that he found nothing in the few places that there were in the town. Clay re-told his account of the shelter and the almost-horrific sight in the church, if he had opened the casket, he was sure he might have just had a heart attack. Just thinking that there was a body in the casket and it had been there rotting for forty to fifty years just messed with his mind. He was starting to not like this trip at all.

"So when it stops raining maybe we can start walking back to the ranch."

"Yeah, good idea, but maybe we should call someone."

"Well, Nate, do you have signal?"

"Nope, I don't."

"Clay?"

"No."

"Guess we are screwed."

Quinn rolled her eyes and she sat near the window looking up at the sky waiting for the clouds to close and the rain to stop so she could head back with her friends. She wanted to go back to her friends, and hopefully they could get some signal out there to call someone to fix their bus. Quinn wanted to go home but if she wanted to walk then she wasn't getting there. She didn't want to walk home. If it took hours to get to where they were at, then it was going to take days on foot to get back. Usually she would be hyped up and determined to do it, but she just simply didn't have the strength.


	4. Chaptire Quatre

Chaptire Quatre:

"You look cold." Clay spoke, handing Quinn his hooded sweater and she slipped it on nodding her head.

She was cold. It was cold inside the store, only because no one has messed with the place in many years. There was nothing working inside of the place. She sighed and she bit down on her lip to get it to stop trembling. The sweater smelled like Clay, she turned her head and smiled just a bit. She didn't want to look to suspicious as to the fact that she loved how Clay smelled. It wasn't a certain type of cologne or anything, or cologne that she knew of because David wore something she knew, and so did Nathan but Clay…Clay was different. She liked it. She grinned inwardly and she glanced over to the window just pleading silently for the rain to stop. She wanted to go home, but she knew…it was no use. Nothing was going to stop the rain; it had to stop on its own.

Haley paced back in forth in the foyer as most of the others just wandered around the mansion. Haley was pacing because she was worried about her sister. Her sister meant everything her. They probably thought she was a bit crazy but Quinn was her twin, it was like just something in Haley that got her. She was worried, to say the least. Brooke was sitting on one of the couches in the living room watching Alex and David flirt like they didn't think Quinn existed. Maybe she was making too big of a deal of the situation. Maybe it was harmless. Julian had tried to tell her to stop but that did no good. So he and Mr. Durham resumed to sitting on the porch watching the rain and talking. Julian always did get along better with adults.

"Where can they be? Is the city that big?" Haley asked.

"Hales just please, calm down." Brooke spoke softly.

The rain had finally stopped and that's when Quinn leaped up for joy. She walked outside and was hit with a giant pocket of air. She coughed a minute and stepped back in the cold store. Then she stepped out again prepared this time to face it. She took off his jacket and handed it back to Clay.

"Thanks for the jacket." She said.

She started walking down the narrow road that leaded to the ranch. Then she noticed the road went directly into the woods. She groaned. Who constructed this place? She wished she knew all the details, but she didn't. All she knew were a few myths and legends about a city that she was going to be staying at for the next week. She kicked the gravel in frustration while Clay and Nathan traveled slowly behind her. She sighed crossing her arms over each other and pressing them together softly taking in a breath. She would be lying if she said there wasn't something there between her and Clay, but she couldn't act on it. It would be wrong to act on it. She had a boyfriend, what the hell was she thinking? She kicked herself mentally for even thinking anything like that.

Haley peered out the window again and then resumed to her crazy pacing.

"Soon enough they'll be here." She told herself. She needed to keep telling herself that or she was going to drive herself insane.

Arriving to the wooded area she looked straight through it and she could see the plantation house. All she had to do was get through the wooded area. Quinn didn't know what kinds of things were in the wooded area. But, then again, her sister and her friends might be at the house, so if they could get through it then she knew that she could get through it. She wasn't a wimp but she definitely didn't want to get eaten by a bear or anything.

"There might be animals in there."

"Yes there might be, but if you want to get back to the house and see your boyfriend you're going to have to go through there."

"Yeah, I guess so."

Quinn mustered up all the confidence she had in her tiny frame and she stepped into the dark wooded area to get back to the plantation where they were going to be staying. Talk about a twisted field trip. What kind of school would allow this? All the field trips Quinn had been on had been to museums or amusement parks. Quinn pushed a branch out of her way ducking under it and moving forward through the area.

After an hour of waiting Haley finally saw the three emerge from the woods. She jumped up and she exited the house running towards her twin sister. Jumping on her sister she held her tight in her arms.

"I thought you weren't coming back. I was freaking out because I was worried."

"I wouldn't leave you here at this grimy place alone Haley-Bob. I promise you that."

"Good, alright, now I have to hug my husband."

Quinn walked towards the house with Clay and she let him go in first. Mr. Durham was filled with joy when he noticed that they had made it back alive. He hugged both Quinn and Clay and Quinn made her way over to the table and sat down in it.

"When will the bus be fixed, Mr. Durham?"

"I don't know Alex. Did you guys find anyone in town?"

Quinn shook her head and replied, "Nope, we didn't. It was completely abandoned but it seemed like there might have been someone here recently. There was a truck, and the engine was warm, so it felt like someone had driven up while we were inside the buildings."

"Why didn't you just drive back then? Steal the truck?" Alex asked.

"Because that's illegal and breaking law is not my strong suit. I'm going to go find David before I breathe in all this nonsense and it effects my brain."

Quinn got up and she walked over to the stairs. Stepping up each one made her feel kind of weird. The stairs creaked and the railing wasn't all that sturdy. She wasn't going to like this next week at all. She had the feeling in her veins. Getting upstairs, she called for her boyfriends a few times but she got no answer. Finally hearing some rummaging in the bathroom she shrugged off her shoulders and waited for him to get out of the bathroom. When the door opened, it was sure enough David coming out of the bathroom.

"You're back; did you find anyone in town?" He asked.

She went to hug him and he hugged her quickly before pulling away from her. She raised her eyebrow and she followed him downstairs. When she stepped into the room she got an eerie feeling and she noticed there was some tension growing in the room.

"Alright so this is…awkward." Clay spoke and he went back into the kitchen. "Quinn, you want to help me with dinner?" He called from the kitchen.

She excused herself from the weird feeling in the room between David and the others and she walked into the kitchen where Clay and Nathan were having a soda and waiting for the pans to heat up on the stove.

"Thank you." Quinn said as soon as she entered the kitchen.

"I had a weird feeling in there, like something happened while we were gone and I saw you fidgeting. I figured I'd save you."

"Well thank you Superman, I needed the save."

They both smiled and Nathan just laughed. Nathan knew that there was something between Quinn and Clay and there always had been since the first day of school. Nathan also wasn't a big fan of David and would prefer Quinn with Clay but she was in love with David. Nathan couldn't rip her away from that, but he had made his opinion many times very clear to Quinn about David and she understood. David wasn't the best guy on the planet and she deserved more. Nathan took a sip of his soda and turned back to the stove to stir the macaroni.

Quinn gazed over to the living room where David and Alex were talking and laughing it up. He was sitting awful close to her though. He wouldn't even hug Quinn. She shook her head and she resumed to help Clay with the cooking.

"Can you help me with this?" Quinn asked.

Clay nodded moving behind her resting a hand on her hip and one hand on top of hers helping her with the cooking of the hash browns in the pan. First she tensed up but when he squeezed her side she rested immediately. He had this power over her and she couldn't deny that she didn't enjoy it.


	5. Chaptire Cinq

Chapter Cinq:

"Get your hands off of her, you fool."

"Dude, chill, I was just showing her how to cook something." Clay said pulling his hands off Quinn and rolling his eyes at David.

"I would have stayed 'chilled' if you didn't have your slimy hands on my girlfriend."

"Well, if you put your hands on her a little more, showing her a little more affection, maybe she wouldn't have to come running to me." Clay retorted and that was like pulling the needle out of the haystack, pressing the final button.

David launched at Clay shoving him into the stove, the pan of hot food flying up and landing on Clay's back. Clay didn't wince once, but the pain from the hot oil was horrible.

"David, walk away, now!" Quinn yelled.

David gave Clay one last push to the shoulder and it took all Clay had not to launch back at him. David walked away, fueled with anger. David slammed the wooden door behind him causing things in the house, such as the old chandelier to shake. Quinn looked at Clay and gave him an apologetic look. He shook his head and Haley walked over to help him with his back and his oil stained shirt. He knew he was going to have some scarring from the hot oil but it wasn't like he'd die from it. He'd be fine.

Outside, Quinn and David were sitting in silence. She could practically hear him as his anger was released with fist clenching and heavy breathing.

"Why did you do that to him? He did not do anything to you. He was teaching me something and you had to be such a…" She trailed off and he practically understood what she meant.

"Just leave it alone Quinn, I was coming to the defense of my girlfriend. I didn't want some other guy touching you."

"Do you see me get _that_ upset when you are all over Alex?" Quinn asked.

There was a long pause after she asked that.

"Exactly what I thought,"

"I'm not all over Alex all the time!" He protested.

"But you shouldn't be all over at all, David! You're my boyfriend, not hers. You are not supposed to throw your girlfriend to the side to be with her."

"I never did that!"

"You did in there! I tried to hug you and you pushed me away and you guys were chilling on the couch, all close and intimate and you were touching her!"

Sure David was in the wrong just a bit, but he didn't realize it at the time. Quinn had enough of him and his bogus stories. She was done with him trying to make excuses for himself. She was done jumping right back into his arms whenever he apologized to her. She couldn't do that anymore because it was running her life, and she didn't want to be so weak anymore.

"I'm done." Quinn whispered after another long silence.

David and Quinn had been together for three almost four long years, and she was just done.

"What?" He asked.

"I'm done; I do not want to be put through these constant mind games anymore. I love you, David but I can not go on like this. I'm sorry."

She stood up and she patted his shoulder, a tear falling from the corner of her eye, before she retreated back inside and up into her room. After she went inside, not 5 minutes later Alex walked outside to check on him.

"You ok, Dave?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"Ok, but if you need anything, don't hesitate to ask."

"I won't. Thanks," She said.

Alex retreated back inside and David sat there for a few minutes before getting up and walking inside himself. Grabbing a flashlight and his cell phone he walked back outside.

"David, where are you going?" The coach asked.

"Just for a little midnight walk, I'll be back. I need to clear my mind." He said and he walked away from the dreaded house they were staying at.

David shined his flashlight on the road that he was walking down. He was a good mile or so away from the house. Then his world went black, and after that he had no conscious of the world.

About fifteen minutes later, he stumbled awake, and he looked around for a moment. Then the world went black again as he felt another striking blow to the head.

The next morning, Quinn was up early. She had checked in on David's room but he wasn't there. The coach was up doing a crossword book that he had brought with him and drinking some coffee.

"Good morning, Quinn, how about when everyone wakes up we go into town and get that meat that was in the back freezer of that store? We can grill up a good barbeque tonight."

"That sounds good to me. Do you know if David ever came back last night?"

"No, I don't. I went to bed. Maybe one of the other students knows."

"I can ask."

"Alex…" Quinn said knocking on the door. Alex stumbled to the door.

"What do you want?"

"Did David ever come back last night?"

"I don't know. He's your boyfriend."

"No, I kind of broke up with him last night. I thought you might have been up or something when he returned. I guess he just went out exploring again. Thanks anyways."

Once the rest of the students were all dressed and ready to go it was nearing lunch time. They were going to head to the store that Quinn had staked out at, during the beginning of the trip and get the meat that was packaged in the freezer in the back.

"Do you smell that?"

"Smell what?" Clay asked as the group was walking towards the city.

"That smells like a rotting animal or something.

"Well, there are a bunch of wooded areas out here. There are bound to be dead animals." Clay reasoned.

Quinn nodded her head but as they kept walking the smell just got harsher. She followed the scent but was not prepared for what her eyes had just seen.


	6. Chaptire Six

Chaptire Six:

"David!" Quinn yelled wanting to run up to the half eaten body but her legs seemed to of escaped out from under her, they felt like gel.

"Oh my…" Alex covered her mouth.

A few gasps came from the others but soon they were pushed away from the scene.

"What did you do to him?!" Alex yelled shoving Quinn.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"He went off last night. He was angry and pissed after you talked to him. He never came back last night because of YOU!"

"You're insane."

"I'm not insane. All I know is that you broke up with him and he went off into the dark late at night, in the middle of nowhere and now he's dead. As far as I'm concerned, you killed him."

Quinn stood there fuming with anger. It took all she had and Clay to hold her back from attacking and beating the hell out of Alex for saying that. She would have never expected this, but she did break up with him last night. So partially it could have been her fault, but he shouldn't have wandered off.

"Calm down." Clay whispered.

"I can't do that. My ex-boyfriend is dead and his whore of a mistress is saying I killed him!"

"Come on, calm down. Alex and the others start walking. Clay and Quinn, stay with me." The coach ordered to split the ladies apart.

"Do you have any reception?" Clay asked.

Quinn glanced down at her cell phone and shook her head negatively.

"All right, we have to get him out of there. I don't think you should be here though Quinn."

"I'm going to go catch up with them. No worries." She said.

She started walking. She caught up with the others and walked with them. Her sister tried to comfort her but it didn't help. David meant a lot to her but she didn't want to hurt anymore. She was tired of being torn down, and tired of the feelings not being reciprocated between the two of them.

"It wasn't your fault sweetie."

"That's not what Alex thinks."

"Well, who cares what Alex thinks? David was upset and went off. I'm pretty sure—"

"What?"

"Wait a second; David was smart enough to know not to wander in the woods when it was late. I know I don't give him that much credit, but come on. David would be smart enough to know not to do that. There is someone else in this town. We just don't know where they are hiding."

"Hales, we checked every building. There was a truck that had been recently fired up, but that's it. Everything else is deserted."

"Then how did David get there? He didn't wander off into the woods!"

"I don't know." Quinn finally replied, taking in what her sister said.

David was smart enough to know not to do that. He didn't know where they were, and he sure wasn't that brave enough to go into the woods alone.

Clay and the coach caught up with them a half hour after the group arrived into the town.

"There's that truck again!"

Quinn ran over to the truck, pushing some hair out of her face and feeling the hood of the truck. It was warm. Someone was here, they were hiding.

"Come out, you punk. You killed him! I know that you did!"

"Quinn, calm down." Clay said putting his firm hands around her arms trying to calm her down.

His touch instantly soothed her.

"I can't calm down, Clay! This is not funny! This person…killed David!"

She pounded the hood of the truck a few times with her balled up fist before lowering her head and putting her head in her hands. She started to just let it all out. Clay wrapped her in his arms and just held her, knowing this was only the beginning of the grieving process.

"Let's just get this over with."

"All right, let's do this."

Quinn pushed open the glass door to the small convenient store that she took shelter in from the rain just yesterday. Walking around the shelves and behind the counter, she entered the freezer. Goosebumps arose on her arms.

"Here's a light."

Clay pulled the chain and a light came one. The whole freezer was full of food. Food that had probably been frozen for the longest period, but it was food and in the freezer it could last long and still be healthy enough to eat unlike if it were left out in the open air.

"We have dinner for the week!" The coach said and Nathan laughed searching the shelves.

"The keys were left in the truck guys; we can haul this meat to the house then bring the truck back."

"Brooke, you stole the keys to the truck?"

"I didn't steal them. I went to look inside the truck and there the keys were. So, I decided to borrow them. Big difference, Quinn,"

All of them laughed at their friend. They hauled the meat into the back of the truck and they all climbed in the truck. Some of them stayed in the cab and some of them sat in the bed of the truck with the meat while the coach drove. Arriving back at the house, they all unloaded the meat and set it in the house's basement freezer.

"Quinn and Clay, take this truck back."

"All right," They agreed.

On their way back into town, not one of them said a word.

"What's on your mind?"

"David. Who could do something like that? I mean, you see it all the time on television...but never expect it to happen to someone near and dear to you."

"I know."

They dropped off the truck, and walked back to the house. They were back at the house before it had gotten dark. There was dinner waiting for them.

"I'm not very hungry. I think I'll lie down."

Quinn retreated upstairs and into her bedroom. She changed into her sweats and her tank top before sitting on the edge of her bed. She tossed and turned in bed for an hour or two before she heard the door open. Her head snapped towards the door and she saw Clay's figure in the doorway.

"Hi…"

"How are you?"

She mumbled incoherently.

"I see."

Clay shut the door behind himself and he crawled into the small bed with her wrapping his strong arms around her tightly. Once he did that she buried her face in his arms and she broke down in tears.


	7. Chaptire Sept

Chaptire Sept:

The next morning came around faster then expected. Most of the group was up and socializing downstairs in the morning while Quinn was huddled up in her room, not daring to see the sunlight. She was still very torn up about David's death and Alex's accusation.

"So is Quinn still in her room?"

"Yeah, I guess so."

"I mean, you would know right? You were in there with her all night."

"Do you not know how to show any respect Alex?"

"What do you mean?"

"She is very upset over someone who just _died_ and you are here making snotty comments, about me sleeping with her last night. Could you be anymore rude?"

Alex sat there biting back her lip and Clay shook his head. If he had to stay one more moment here with her, he was going to go insane. Alex wasn't being respectful at all to David's death and Quinn's mourning.

"And you don't think that I'm upset about it either?"

"All you want is attention, and everyone to give you pity on what you're feeling."

"Clay, man, come on. Calm down," Nathan said holding him back from completely exploding out of anger on Alex. "Why don't you go and check up on Quinn?"

"Fine, but don't expect me to be entirely happy."

Clay went to check up on Quinn while Alex stayed downstairs and felt like a horrible person.

"Am I that horrible?"

"It's the way you present yourself." Haley spoke up in a bitter tone. "We're all not in the best mood because a friend of ours has just died and you are here wanting us to give you pity when, in fact, Quinn is suffering more then you are. That was her boyfriend for three years."

"I don't try to be selfish, I guess it's just the way I naturally am."

"Well you need to change because acting like that you is going to lose everyone close to you."

"I know…"

Clay stood outside in the middle of the afternoon skipping rocks in the lake behind the house. It was a dark colored lake which he would choose rather to stay out of.

"Clay…"

"Alex."

"I don't want you to be pissed off at me."

"Well good luck at that."

"I'm sorry. I know I acted pretty selfish, and I guess I've always been that way because I was afraid of people finding out my true self. You know how some people put up a guard on their heart? Well I do that, I put that guard up of being nasty, snotty and selfish. It's a front."

"You could have at least let down the front to respect Quinn."

"I know, and I'm going to apologize to her for everything I've done to her."

"Did he ever cheat with you on her?"

"Yes, but he told me that he was slowly going to let Quinn on that there was something going on and when she finally broke up with him that he'd get with me. I kind of figured I was just a 'good time' though. He told me he loved me."

"I always knew that David wasn't a good guy, but does anyone want to listen to me?"

"I take it they didn't listen to you. Especially Quinn didn't listen."

"I told her from the start that David was a horrible guy, but she didn't want to listen because he had the charm of a snake. He knew how to persuade her just right."

"I know that you've always wanted her."

Clay shrugged his shoulders, not really giving a verbal response to that statement but for the first time he saw a different side of Alex. Clay was a strong believer that some people were just plain horrible, that they didn't have a nice side. That's what he thought of Alex, till today. She showed him that there was someone behind that guard and front that she puts up to protect herself.

Alex pursed her lips and she walked away from Clay and returned to the house. David wasn't a good guy but his life was taken last night, and he felt a little bit of remorse because he had been nasty with him right before he was gone. Sighing, she returned inside and saw Quinn coming down the stairs. Once Quinn laid eyes on Alex, she was quick to turn around.

"Quinn! Please, let me explain." Alex said.

"There is nothing for you to explain to me. It's my entire fault. I killed him remember?"

"It was the heat of the moment."

Quinn didn't say anything, just proceeded to walk back upstairs and shut herself in her room. Later that night, the smell of meat came rushing into the house. Someone was cooking the meat that they had found. She retreated downstairs and saw everyone sitting out on the front patio, talking and grilling the meat. Grabbing a soda and a blanket she joined them all outside.

"Morning sunshine,"

"Morning,"

"You ok?"

"Yeah, I'm good."

Clay looked at Quinn and knew that she wasn't fine. How would she be fine? David was dead, and she was accused of killing him because she broke up with him. It was pretty messed up, and she knew that she was going to be messed up for a good long time, but she knew that she would also be fine because she had friends who were behind her 100% of the way, she had an amazing twin sister who had her back whenever everyone else didn't. She had a good life, but she missed him.

"Why don't you go talk to her?" Alex asked nudging Clay's side as they watched the meat cook.

"I will, I'm just going to give her some space, you know?"

"The best thing for someone when they are grieving is to give them support, but not sympathy."

Clay nodded and he flipped the meat over with his spatula.

"Are you eating?"

Quinn shook her head. She wasn't that hungry.

"As tempting as it smells, I'm not too hungry." Quinn replied.

"All right," Clay replied and pursed his lips together.


	8. Chaptire Huit

Chaptire Huit:

Quinn sat on the front porch and relaxed her head against the door frame. She was still grieving over David's death, but she was a little better now. Not so much grieving as there was just guilt, still refraining from the comment that Alex dealt out to her.

"Quinn, it's cold out here. Come back inside."

"I kind of like it out here. Besides I have a blanket."

Clay pulled up a chair and sat down next to her. The clouds were dark and thick in the sky. It was like a threat that it was to rain soon.

"It's going to rain."

"Thank you for informing me, I so didn't notice."

"Hey, I was just joking around with you."

"I was joking around with you too. See I can put on a great sarcasm act."

"So you'll be an actress when you graduate."

"No, not happening. I will not be transformed into those people in Hollywood. Full of drama and stupid lies."

"Well you don't have to be part of Hollywood. You can work for them, but not be apart of them."

Quinn listened to him and she nodded. She didn't like to act as much as she did to write the screenplays and cast the characters. She was more a behind-the-scenes kind of girl. The rain started to pour down like a hail storm.

"Want to go inside now?"

Quinn shook her head.

Inside, Haley sat at the kitchen table enjoying her bowl of fruit that she had taken along with her from home.

"What's on your mind Hales?"

"Nothing much, just thinking about Quinn and if she'll ever recover from this kind of tragedy,"

"We'll never be able to recover from such a heartbreaking tragedy but we have to at least try. It will always hurt us to know that our loved one is gone but he's in a better place."

"I know, Nate."

Haley's hand was soon covered by Nathan's. Brooke sat on the couch listening to her iPod when she saw Nathan holding Nathan's hand. The love was sickening. She didn't have anything against love; she had just been burnt to many times in the past that she never got to feel that kind of love.

Brooke also worried about finding someone and then it turning out like Quinn and David's relationship. Completely blinded, because of your emotional feelings to not see what was really going on there. As the day progressed and the rain continued to pour down heavily on the house, the sky grew darker.

Under the house, there was a few rattling noises from the thunder every time it rolled.

"When are we going to make our next move?"

"I don't know yet. I'm trying to think of a perfect way to kill."

"Which one do you want to kill?"

"Let's go for the coach. Once the chaperone is gone, the kids will have no safe feeling of protection and it'll make them vulnerable to be preyed on."

"You are evil."

"I just want anyone who comes here to pay for what someone else did to my friends."

"What exactly did happen?"

"That's none of your business. I thought you were supposed to be my accomplice, not my therapist."

"Sorry."

The woman turned and gazed at the shelves that had giant objects wrapped up in plastic.

"What are those?"

"I think you know what these are. Well it would probably be more appropriate to say, you know _who_ these are."

The woman kinked her eyebrow and she chuckled manically.

Quinn turned her head, hearing what sounded like laughter coming from the side of the house. But there was no one else outside, and she didn't recognize that laugh. Quinn didn't let it bother her and she went on carrying her conversation with Clay.

Later that night, when everyone seemed to be sound asleep in their beds, the coach was in his room reading his book and listening to the rain fall on the roof. The lamp flickered a few times and then shut off completely. Whitey reached down and checked the plug. It was out of the outlet. Letting out a deep breath he got out of bed and got down on his knees pushing the plug back into the outlet.

Though when the light came on there was a woman in a black jog suit standing there near the closet, near him. Whitey screamed because of the fright she gave him and she launched wrapping her hand around his mouth so he wouldn't wake the students.

"You will do what I say, or your kids will die."

Whitey mumbled a few times trying to disagree with the woman but then he gave in protecting the lives of the students. She put a sock in his mouth and made him write a letter, a forged suicide letter. What reason could the coach even have for wanting to kill his own self?

Once he wrote the letter though, the woman finished him off anyways. She shot off her 9 millimeter a few times. A few of the students shot their heads up when they heard the gun shots.

"Nate." Haley shook her husband a few times.

"What?"

"Did you hear that? It sounded like a gun shot."

"Hales, are you sure it's not just the crackling of the thunder? It can play tricks on your like that sometimes."

"I don't think it was the thunder, babe."

Quinn opened Haley's door just moments later.

"Hales, did you hear that?"

"The noise that sounded like a gun shot? I did."

"Brooke and I heard it. We were going to check it out but it's also very dark downstairs."

"I'll come, I have a flash light."

Haley picked up her flashlight from her bag and she got out of bed. She joined Brooke and her twin sister in the hallway and she flicked the flashlight on.

"Where's Alex?"

"She's sound asleep. You can't wake her up unless there was a tornado."

"When I sleep, I sleep like a dead person and you are telling me that she didn't hear _that?_" Haley asked.

"It's true. She does sleep like a dead person." Quinn gave her input.

They stopped in their tracks when they heard a shuffling coming from their coach's room.

"Maybe he's just up again. He usually likes to read, he's not a person for sleeping."

"That would explain why he's so grumpy sometimes."

"Brooke! He's just got insomnia. Ever since his wife died, he hasn't been able to sleep."

"Oh…"

Haley and the other two girls continued downstairs and flipped on the light switch when they got down the stairs. The kitchen and the hallway lit up, and everything was untouched and undisturbed. There was no one down there.

"That's so weird."

"I know, how about I make some tea and we just kind of chill down here waiting to see if the noise comes again?"

"That works for me." Quinn said and she sat down on the couch with her friend Brooke.


	9. Chaptire Neuf

Chaptire Neuf:

Quinn woke up to a shrill scream coming from upstairs. She darted up the stairs from where she had fallen asleep on the couch the night before.

"Hales?"

"Whitey he…he left a note."

"What the…"

Quinn didn't even wince because she was so angry with whoever was here with them. Some reason, she had a sneaky suspicion it could have been one of her young friends among her. She didn't know what went on after she went to sleep, or when she was asleep before the noise last night.

"No…no, this can't be right. This is Whitey!"

Quinn practically flipped out. No one could blame her though. She wasn't the only one who thought that this thing was a complete façade, a complete set up. Whitey was one of the happiest old men, you could know. He comforted everyone when they needed it; he was like that grandfather everyone wanted.

"So you're not the only one who thinks this was completely set up?"

"I don't _think_ this is set up! I know it is."

"Quinn, maybe he just wanted to be with Camilla."

Quinn didn't think about that. Maybe Whitey did miss his wife so much that he took this way out. Those thoughts disappeared just as fast as they came though.

"No. That can't be possible. How many years after Camilla has he been around? So why all of a sudden?"

"I think it's the place. It's bound to get to us."

"Then let's get out of here!"

"How are we going to get out of here? The bus broke down."

Haley sunk back and she sighed. What were they going to do? Haley feared for her life. She thought this was completely a set up like her sister did. They thought alike most of the time, but they didn't look anything alike or act anything alike. Some twins, right.

"Let's just go downstairs."

Many of them walked downstairs leaving only Quinn and Haley in the room.

"This was completely set up you know?"

"Yes, I know Quinn. You can't just shoot yourself in the back of the head."

Quinn gazed at the old man slumped over the wooden desk soaked in his own blood. Haley was right. Why didn't the others notice that? Why didn't she notice that?

"How could I not have seen that?"

"Not many people were focused on looking at the body Quinn. This is one messed up field trip. I can tell you one thing. I'm never going on another field trip again."

Quinn agreed with her sister.

After a long pause Haley spoke, "What if one of us is next?"

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm saying…what if one of us is the next one to be killed or be set up to make it look like a suicide?"

"Haley, don't think like that. We will never lose each other."

"You don't know that. Who would have ever thought that what happened to David would have happened? Who would have ever thought that what happened to Whitey last night would have happened?"

"I…"

"Exactly, you don't know Quinn. You don't know if our next move is our last."

Quinn stood up and shook her head.

"I can't. I can't be thinking like this."

Quinn opened the door and fled to her room where she shut the door and sat down in silence. How could this happen? First David, now Whitey. She knew that this wasn't going to be good. She always had a sneaky suspicion that this place wasn't going to be good but she did it for the thrill of the mystery.

Reaching down into her suitcase, she unzipped it and then pulled out the papers that were stuffed down in the bottom. It was all this information on this place. Sitting back against the headboard of her bed she wrapped her knees to her chest and started reading. Quinn had done a report for school on the place, but she never got too deep into it to figure what it was really about.

"What are you doing?"

Quinn raised her head.

"Reading."

"What are you reading about?"

"This place, and what story it holds behind it."

"How can you believe something you printed off the internet? Most of the crap on the internet is all lies."

"Maybe so, but what if all this stuff that's happening isn't just some coincidence?"

"Quinn, come on. Stop reading that junk."

"Clay, how can you say all this is just crap?"

"Because you printed it off the internet, if you wanted to find a reliable source…try a library."

Quinn looked up at Clay and nodded her head. He was right. She needed to find a library. Quinn jumped off the bed, and ran out of her room.

"Where are you going?"

Quinn ran towards one of the locked rooms and tried to pull the door open. Quinn kicked the door a few times and the third time she kicked it hard enough for it to knock off its hinges and fall down the stairs to the dark basement. Her twin sister, Haley and Haley's husband Nathan ran to her side. They questioned as to what was down there and Quinn shrugged her shoulders. It seemed like an eerie tune started to play in her head like in the movies.

"It's the basement of Axeland Ranch. Apparently in the papers I was reading it said that the basement lead to a whole other part of the house."

"You're not going down there are you?"

"Of course, I am. I need to find out what is happening here and the only way to do that is to find some information on this place." She said.

Quinn was determined to figure out what the hell was going on in the cabin. There had to be some kind of curse, or supernatural being that was doing this to their friends and their chaperone. Quinn was a big skeptic in the area of curses and supernatural things though. She only watched that stuff on television. It didn't exist. Quinn opened up her cell phone and she started to walk down the stairs to the basement. The stairs creaked behind her causing her to freeze every other step, look around, and resume heading for the basement.

"Is she really going down there?" Clay asked.

"Yeah, I guess so. She is way too stubborn for us to tell her any different." Nathan shrugged.

"You guys let her go down there alone?"

Clay trotted down the stairs behind Quinn and his hand touched her petite waist. He whispered that it would be okay because he was right behind her and he always would be. They got to the bottom of the steps and they both looked back at the top. Nathan and Haley were no longer there. Their eyes focused on the door that was on the ground. Clay moved it out of the way and against one of the walls of the basement. Quinn used her cell phone to try to look around the basement but the light was too dim for her to see anything but a few feet ahead of her. Clay reached out in his back pocket and pulled out his reading light.

"That's much better." Quinn said putting away her cell phone and taking the reading light away from him. She scanned the basement.

"The information was right. There is a whole other part to this house. This basement covers the whole house underneath, and I'm pretty sure more of it."

"I told you." Quinn said.

Clay walked over to the area where there were tons and tons of books on maple oak colored shelves. Quinn followed him with the light and they started searching through the shelves together for the books. Quinn finally found an encyclopedia, and flipped to the appropriate page. There were tons of articles, news clippings, obituary pages that fell out of the book. She sat down on the stone cold floor and looked at some of the newspaper clippings.

"Let's get what we can and take it back up there."

Quinn got up and grabbed as many books that contained information on the ranch as possible and Clay did the same. They returned upstairs and Nathan put a curtain over the basement area knowing they didn't have the tools to fix the door and knowing that he didn't want anyone to wander down those stairs in the dark. Quinn and Clay dropped the books on the counter and opened up the encyclopedia again.

"This encyclopedia holds tons of information on this place. Someone obviously has been here recently due to all the newspaper clippings and stuff that's in here."

Quinn set every single newspaper clipping on the counter and they all looked at them.

"This is something that happened in late 1964. A high school group of students took a field trip to Axeland Ranch and each student was axed off one by one in such a unique way that it was difficult to forget such a thing. Then the last girl Mae, they say she was killed, but they never found her body. The only reason that the police came to the police was because after they were expected to return, they didn't and it was getting suspicious. They found everybody lined up on the porch waiting for police to find them. A coroner determined the cause of death of each body. But no one ever found Mae. People think that Mae still haunts the house, or that she might even still be alive."

"She can't still be alive. Well, she could be but who would want to survive after such a horrible thing? Who would hide from the police when they came to search the premises?"

"That's just it. Mae Scott was supposedly a real grudge holding girl. She had tons of dark secrets and so my guess is that she is glad they were dead."

"Yeah and she would be the only suspect in the case. She would have easily gotten the death penalty without any confirmation or testimony."

"So who killed David? Who killed Whitey?"

"I don't know. I can't explain that just yet."

"We will figure it out okay?" Haley said and hugged her sister softly.

The students all went about their day, doing their normal activities but they were also all watching their backs and watching one another to see who would make the next move. Suspicions had risen in the house that someone among them was brutally murdering their peers, and Whitey. All suspicions though pointed to Quinn. That wasn't possible though. Alex was the first one to suspect anything towards Quinn but then Brooke. Though Quinn and Brooke were together when they heard the shot go off maybe she and one of the boys or Clay were in it together. Tension was rising in the house.

"I need to go into town."

Clay looked at Quinn, raising his head from the book he was reading on Axeland Ranch.

"Why?"

"This book says that there is a church in the northwest part of town and in there is more books on the town and its people from the early 1900s. The church itself could give us some answers."

"We'll check it out tomorrow. It's getting too late to head out now."

Alex and Brooke were sitting upstairs in Alex's room discussing their thoughts on what was happening. Sure Brooke was never one to agree with Alex. But maybe she was on to something. Brooke and Alex had a plan to follow Quinn and Clay tomorrow or keep their eyes on them to see where they were going to go and what they were going to do. Brooke had her doubts also. Her suspicions were stronger.


End file.
